E-Government Is Only The Beginning

Greetings and  Salutations,

All good things must come to an end, and there is no exception when it comes to my e-Government course at Troy University and this blog.  Over the past nine weeks, we have journeyed through the several areas of e-Government which included the framework as taught by Dr. Ali Farahani at USC, the problem associated with the digital divide, and the really neat technology available through geospatial information systems.  On the first blog in this series, I asked the question, “What's ahead?”  I think now is the time to answer that question.

In general, e-Government will be the gold standard in politics and public administration.  Even though this blog is geared specifically towards e-Government and law enforcement, e-Government is a trans-agency phenomenon that will force every corner of government (federal, state, and local) to use it or fall by the wayside. So whether we are talking about the 2016 Presidential Election or how to report suspicious activity to our local law enforcement agency, e-Government will be a permanent part of the equation.

One of the largest factors in e-Government is going to be Social Media.  Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, Instagram, LinkedIn, Pinterest, Flikr, and Vine, just to name a few, will be the way that many of us will get information.  Police agencies everywhere release alerts and newsworthy information on their social media sites, and some even expand to YouTube.  Political candidates are announcing their bids for office on social media.  Just to understand how much this has exploded, when Secretary of State John Kerry help broker the nuclear arms deal in Iran, it was through Twitter he made his first statements.  However, despite these giant leaps in social media, I also warned that not being social media smart can also be one's undoing.  So it is important to understand these sites and how to use, and then use them smartly!  In law enforcement, social media can be our best friend and worst enemy.  Agencies need to manage how they use social media and stay ahead of the curve, because when we don't, social media will end up managing us, and to that point, I assure you it never ends well.


E-Government cannot leave 1/3 of the world's population in the dark.  I am talking about the digital divide and the availability of technology and communication to those who lack resources.  In the very near future, there will be almost nothing you can do if you can't do it online.  Only 30% of the world's population has access to the Internet, but these less industrialized nations are an important part of the world's equation.  The United States and European Union cannot do it alone.  We need everyone to be a part of the technological story we are writing right now.  With digital communication comes education and a world with educated people means a better tomorrow.  This may sound a little strange, but digital communication in the very near future may be a right because there will be no other way to be socially involved.   As for law enforcement, it will be important that we let our citizens know what services we provide online and encourage people to utilize them.  Also, if we find an area that is lacking, let our commission or governing body know so that everyone has equal access to government services.

Finally, what about us?  Each week I close with what do we need to do as the chief of our agency?  Remember, we have obtained funds through budgeting, we have written rules and regulations regarding the use of social media and e-Government, our legal team has reviewed these policies and are ready to act if we have legal issues, our IT department is incorporating social media into our electronic infrastructure, and our employees are on board with the idea.  As the chief, we need to engage!  As simple as that sounds, that's what we need to do.  Don't give lip service to these ideas and then hideaway in our office hoping everything goes well.  This means we need “tweet” what is going on.  It means we need to encourage employees to be okay with being on camera doing great things.  It means that when there is bad news, get out in front of it and put things into context.  We drive social media content instead of only responding to it.  It also means when things go bad, take responsibility and fix the problem.  As the chief, we need to lead which may mean being a servant leader, but a leader.  E-government is not going away.  So let's grab the bull by the horns and enjoy the ride!  Thank you for reading and I wish all of you well on your future endeavors.  

This blog series was completed for course PA-6679 E-Government in the Master of Public Administration program at Troy University.  For more information about the MPA or other degree programs at Troy University, visit www.troy.edu.

With Liberty & E-Governance For All

Welcome Fellow Bloggers,

And so our journey continues.  For the past seven weeks, we have explored everything from the creation of e-Governance to the advances in Geospatial Technology.  Today, however, I would like to talk about something of even greater importance which is the digital divide and ethics in e-Governance.  I think that long ago, the Founding Fathers of the United States would have had no idea about the technological advancements  we enjoy today.  Understanding a bit about these men, they truly wanted a government for and by the people and they wanted the people to be active and inclusive in decision making.  As I start today's blog, I wonder if they had known about our current technology, would they have been for the inclusion of everyone to have equal access to the Internet and all the good and bad that digital communication allows?  Would they have seen e-Governance as the transparent and synchronous tool that it claims to be or would they have taken a moment of pause to address the many concerns we have have today?

The first thing that should come to mind when we think of government in general should be ethics; a philosophy that involves systematizing, defending, and recommending concepts of right and wrong conduct.  However, when we REALLY think of government, we often think in terms of the cartoon to the left where government claims to be one thing, but is firmly entrenched in something else…..corruption.  We might say to ourselves, if regular government is so corrupted, how do we expect e-Government to be any better?  Recent stories of abuses by the National Security Agency and other government groups prying into our private lives under the blanket of national security would and should give us pause.  That pause is what causes people to not want to be involved in government and oftentimes develops a cynical attitude towards it.  Ask yourself if you feel that way, and then go back to my original question, how would the Founding Fathers have addressed e-Government and digital technology?

Considering all of that, now I would like you to think about the digital divide phenomenon.  If you want to apply for a job today, how do you do that nowadays?  Monster, Indeed, Career Builder?  If you want to partake in government by interacting with our elected leaders, how do you do that?  E-mail, online forums, social media?  Now imagine that you are poor, don't have a computer, and if you do, there is not enough bandwidth in which to use it effectively.  That, my friends, is the digital divide!  It is a widening gap between the wealthy and the poor; between first world nations and third world nations.  Put another way, the have and have nots!  All of us reading my blog right now knows that digital communication is a necessity to make it in this world, not a luxury.  How would one expect the poor to help change their status in life if they don't have access to the means to make that happen?  And then ask yourself, is denying people something that is necessary to their survival ethical?  Now ask yourself, what would the Founding Fathers have said?

It is not all bad news.  At least the government recognizes there is a problem.  In video below, President Obama talks about the digital divide and what our country is doing to curb the problem:


So here we are again, the chief of our agency, and we have the Information Technology Department ready to go!  We have our legal team ready to go!  We have written directives and policies for our employees so they are ready to go!  The web page is up and running, we have some really cool tech on it, and when we finally go live…nothing…crickets and tumbleweeds.  The page works fine, but our traffic is zip, zilch, nil, nada, zero!  We say to ourselves, how did this happen?  Everything was "ready to go!"  Finally, in a moment of clarity, it hits us.  The people who are most likely to use our services, don't have access to it.  Therefore, we can have synchronous two-way communication between us and our citizens, we can have some awesome 3-D geospatial technology, we can even stream real time calls for service so people know what's going on.  However, without the ability to access it, the technology is no good.  Worse yet, if we know or should have known that these technological advancements don't exist, but the citizens need it to gain access to us, that too is unethical.  So to my fellow bloggers, don't fall into the digital divide trap.  Let's close it.  Talk to your city/county commission.  Talk to your citizens and know what they need.  Make sure what you plan to put out is compatible with their accessibility.  It'll make our job so much easier.  Next week will be my final blog in this series and it will complete my e-Governance course for Troy University.  Thank you for reading.  Until next week.

GIS, GPS, and Geospatial Technology

Greetings and Salutations Fellow Bloggers,

Here we are, seven weeks into our exploration of e-governance and its relation to law enforcement and now its time to look at the "cooler" side of government service. As we near the end of this series, this week we will look at some innovations in Geospatial Technology. Geospatial technology is equipment used in visualization, measurement, and analysis of earth's features and uses such systems as GPS (global positioning systems), GIS (geographical information systems), and RS (remote sensing).

Somewhere up above us right now traveling at over 17,000 mph, there are numerous satellites that send and receive digital information from us on the ground.  Depending on the satellite's function, they can be used to transmit images, sounds, and even data.  Some of that data can be used to help us find our way around town or give us a virtual image of our surroundings.  This is what I want to hit on today.

GPS is the most common form of geospatial technology that the Average Joe uses on the street (GPS receiver is the name of the actual device consumers use to be technically accurate).  Using complex mathematical algorithms and triangulation between three satellites, our exact position on earth can be determined relative to everything around us.  In law enforcement, this is extremely important because back in the day, officers on the ground had to pull out a handy dandy map and figure out the best way to the scene of a call.  Now with GPS, once the address and starting point is plugged in, everything is calculated for the officer, and in some more complex GPS systems, traffic conditions and real time weather can also be displayed.  This saves money, time, and increases efficiency and customer service.  Many large agencies today use this, but for a large number of smaller agencies, this is simply not the case.  I would argue that while there is certainly a large cost involved, officer safety and liability should always come first making the expense worth it.

GIS is great technology that is probably well known for its use in Google Earth applications.  GIS in conjunction with 3-D applications has a very specific use in law enforcement operations. Imagine a SWAT team having to serve a high risk warrant on a residence, but the layout of the residence is unknown.  Satellite imagery using 3-D applications can give a virtual tour of the structure prior to going in which can save lives, reduce injuries, and can help with planning and execution.  Of course, with the increased use of drone technology, GIS may become a secondary choice in the very near future.  But for now, GIS is the gold standard.  I would suggest that as  GIS becomes more mainstream in government applications, law enforcement may consider building its own database for tactical operations.  Many of the 3-D images as seen on Google Earth are obtained using remote sensing from satellites to create the images.  However, a word of caution when relying on Google Earth.  Many of the images are outdated so it may not always be reliable which is why I suggested that drone technology will be a more reliable and practical alternative in the near future.

The ESRI video below features Christian Carlson who talks about the future of GIS in government applications:

So as you can see, the future is bright for government and the use of GIS applications.  Just remember that for our law enforcement agency, the application will likely be used for internal operations more so than to provide external customer service.  Nonetheless, it is very applicable to our line of work.  As always, we need to make sure our IT department can provide the programming we need and we also need to make sure that we have rules and regulations in place when using the applications.  Next week I will be discussing the issues of social justice and the digital divide.  This will include a look at the ethical issues regarding equity, access, and privacy and how it impacts us in law enforcement.  So until next week, take care.

E-governance & Finding the Right Talent

Greetings Fellow Bloggers,

I hope each of you had a happy and safe 4th of July!  This week, I would like to address some interesting methods in finding future talent for e-government in the very near future and other programs already in place helping our nation move forward.  Ask yourself this question.  The picture to right; what do you see?  Two guys playing a video game?  Maybe two guys "wasting" their talent by being perched in front of a video game system.  I would say to look harder because there really is a positive side to what you could see in this picture.  How about future code writers or two guys involved in the way the future generations will communicate?  That's right!  I'm talking about digital gaming and online communication.  That's the way we will do things around here!

Okay okay!  I'm not suggesting that young people go home and fry your brain on X-Box or Playstation; far from it.  However, for those of us in the government business and who truly want our government to work, we need to do one of two things.  First, we need engage our youth in the manner in which they already engage themselves. Secondly, we need to acknowledge that young people have a greater grasp of digital communication and computers than what many in government can even begin to understand.  This segues into a really neat nonprofit organization known as Code for America.  Started by Jennifer Pahlka in 2009, she sought to bridge the widening gap between technology in the government and the private sectors.  Code for America "builds open source technology and organizes a network of people dedicated to making government services simple, effective, and easy to use."  Do you know whom else uses open source technology besides professional computer programmers?  College students, free lance programmers, digital gamers, and everyday people who have an affinity for computer and writing code.  No one knows who or where the next great code will come from, but if it helps government in its mission, I say let the people have at it.  Below, Jennifer Pahlka addresses the importance of coding to make government work through TED talks:


Now, I am not suggesting that we go out and find a bunch of high school and college dropouts to make our new state of the art website.  I think it goes without saying the importance of a higher education pays in dividends down the road.  What I am suggesting is the future talent can come from anywhere and can be anyone.  So when we look to develop new systems for government use, we should encourage young people to turn that Call of Duty mission into a reason to look at pursuing a technical career in computer programming.  Another way to make this work for government is to allow open source coding so that the hobbyist who knows code can contribute as well.  Remember, these are the people who are part of the population who we need to engage in government.  Sometimes the best ideas won't always come from our IT department.

So how does this affect those of us in the law enforcement side of government?  A lot!  However, in many cases, we will be dependent upon our city, county, or state to take the lead on the code writing aspect.  This does not mean we should be a silent partner taking a backseat in the quest for better government services.  Law enforcement is a large part of the equation.  This means we need to get in the ear of our government leaders and let them know what services our agency needs to provide to the citizens.  As I said several blogs ago, law enforcement is the most visible of all government entities so we have a lot at stake here.  This is also a great opportunity for some community involvement.  The next time we in law enforcement have the chance to interact with youth, we should remind them that law enforcement is not always about handcuffs and being hauled off to jail.  We need programmers and technical employees as well to make the whole thing work.

I hope you all have the chance to check out Code for America's website.  It really is an example of people engaging in government.  So the next time you stand in line for a driver's license, remember, it could be YOU that can help solve that problem.  Thank you for reading, and until next time.

Gary